There are no more reprieves.
There also are no more third-place games to help teams extend their seasons.
Starting tonight, area boys and girls basketball teams will have to win or they will have to go home.
The New Hope (Class 5A), Aberdeen (Class 3A), West Oktibbeha and West Lowndes (Class 1A) high school boys basketball teams will play host to Mississippi High School Activities Associations games tonight, while Columbus (Class 6A), West Point (Class 5A), East Oktibbeha and Hamilton (Class 1A) will go on the road to try to extend their seasons.
Weather forced the postponement of many girls basketball playoffs games last night. Games involving Columbus, West Point, West Lowndes, and West Oktibbeha were rescheduled for Wednesday and Thursday.
None of the teams wants to have a start like the New Hope High boys had Saturday against Oxford in the Class 5A, region 2 title game at West Point High. The Trojans shot 2 of 14 in the first quarter and fell behind the Chargers 20-4 after eight minutes. Somehow, though, New Hope found a way to creep back into the game. In the fourth quarter, a 3-pointer by Demyis Mayberry (team-high 23 points) tied the game at 50 with 3 minutes, 35 seconds remaining. Mayberry added 1 of 2 free throws 30 seconds later to help New Hope take one of only two leads in the game. Free throws by Oxford’s Josh Gibbs and New Hope’s Jaylon Bardley in the final 26.8 seconds set the stage for overtime.
In the four-minute extra session, Oxford scored first and never relinquished the lead. New Hope had two chances later in OT to tie the game before the final sequence, when Oxford’s Jarkel Joiner stole the ball from Mayberry as he was attempting to shoot a potential game-tying 3-pointer from the top of the key in the final seconds.
“The first quarter we played horrible,” said Mayberry, who tied for team-high scoring honors with Terryonte Thomas. “That wasn’t New Hope basketball. The second half and overtime, we stepped it up a little bit. We played very well in the second half.”
Mayberry, Bardley, and Shemar Johnson are three of six seniors on New Hope’s roster who will try to engineer a faster start to keep their prep careers going. All three likely will have a chance to play basketball at the next level, but they don’t want to leave anything to chance and would love to have several more chances to catch the eye of a college coach or two.
“We have to come out way stronger than we did tonight, way stronger,” Mayberry said when asked what New Hope would have to do in its next game (tonight against Canton) to avoid a slow start like the one it had against Oxford. “We came out slow, real slow. We gave them the ball and turned it over.”
Thomas, who is only a sophomore, has two more full seasons left, but he also recognizes the Trojans will have to play with greater urgency from the opening tip if they want to get a chance to go to Jackson State and then Mississippi Coliseum in Jackson to have a chance to play for a state title.
Thomas said New Hope will have to have more energy and will have to play better defense if it hopes to extend its season. Even though he was battling the effects of a fever, Thomas played well and displayed his scoring ability facing the basket and on the low block. He said Saturday he hoped to be feeling better and that the Trojans would respond in practice Monday so they could get back to playing “New Hope basketball,” like Mayberry said.
“We were settling for jump shots instead of attacking,” Thomas said. “In the second half and in the fourth quarter, we started attacking more and getting offensive rebounds and defending.”
New Hope coach Drew McBrayer likes that recipe for success. He said his team showed grit in battling back from a double-digit deficit against one of its biggest rivals. Still, he knows the Trojans can’t put themselves in that big of a hole that early in the game if they want to have a good chance to play a little longer.
“You hope that the schedule you have put together will allow you to know that every time you step on the floor you have to be ready to go,” McBrayer said. “We tried to put it together so we would challenge the kids so they would be ready for games like this, but we just didn’t respond at the start. I don’t know if I have to do something different because that is two nights in a row that we haven’t responded at the start of the ballgame. We were able to come back and win against Saltillo, but the better the competition gets the tougher that makes it.”
Follow Dispatch sports editor Adam Minichino on Twitter @ctsportseditor
Adam Minichino is the former Sports Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
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